It's finals week, so this is going to be more of a teaser post until I get some more time (i.e. this weekend). Today I fought a brikwar with two good friends of mine. I'm teaching them the ropes of the game, so we set up some light terrain on a spare desk and decided to throw 150 CP at each other.

The army I'm using comes from my barbarian horde. For this battle, it featured two beetle chariots as well as a group of 5 Amazon warrioresses. The warband is lead by Valkyria the warrior princess.

A friend whom we'll call "Paco" wanted to try his hands at an all-cavalry contingent. Obviously a force of limited size, but mobile and hard-hitting if it connects.

Here are some images of a new army in town. Not my army. An army that a good friend has built after I convinced him of how ossum brikwars is. We'll call him "Ronald Reagan." He's put together a French Crusader force courtesy of the great torso decals by Saber-Scorpion. In terms of units, he fields a Crusader King, two knights on horseback, four heavy infantry w/ shields and swords and armor, four spearmen, and two archers.

Turns 1-4

The first 4 or so turns went undocumented. Battery life was drained from a weekend Frisbee tournament. At any rate, the Amazon raiders started at the farthest east table edge with a giant lake standing between them and both Paco and Ronald Reagan's forces. As both Paco and Reagan started to square off against each other, I sent the beetle chariots up for some quick flanking positioning, but my adversaries quickly turned on me instead of each other. Thus, while the amazons started spending paltry movements to even get in range for their bows, my opponents played a pretty pussy-foot game of who can get into better charge/defensive position. This dance lasted until around turn 4 which, sadly, was also the first turn the Amazon's could actually attempt to fire at anyone.

Valkyria, the warrior princess, however, was much more successful in causing havoc. Putting on some amazing acrobatic stunts, she deftly somersaulted a guard tower, slew several archers, and ran across the speartips a spearwall to decapitate a soldier from the back lines. At this point she had inadvertently become an "ally" of the Cavalry Marshall after unsuccessfully trying to seduce him with her whiles...and in an act of non-committal, the Marshal left her to die at the hands of the Crusader and his French-types.

Overviews Thus Far

These photos give you a rough idea where the battle has come by turn 5. Both beetle chariots are horribly mangled on opposite ends of the board. The Amazons have used their Spyder Gymnastix to scale the hut and fire their arrows. At the North-western corner of the field, the Cavalry Marshall and an unhorsed dragon knight combat the Crusader king, some spearmen, and some Arab conscripts. Slightly east, the second Dragon Knight is locked in combat with a squad of Heavy French Knights. The bodies of Valkyria and several slain horses litter the battlefield.

Notice too that the lookout tower is ablaze. This is a result of the Crusader King attempting to pray for holy fire to consumer the cottage with the Amazons. Divine Justice was a little off target.

Beginning Turn 5

The two medieval armies continue to be engaged. The newest development is that a stray knight who had lost his way on the eastern flank finally arrives and charges into the Crusaders. The Cavalry Marshal (yellow plume) and his foot-knight continue to struggle against the Crusader King.

As I mentioned, the Marshall had counter-wooed the Warrior Princess, convincing her to confront the Crusader King with him. There she lies dead charged by the king and his footman while the cowardly Marshall runs away into the ruins.

Amazons Turn 5

Currently, the Amazons are in a tight spot. There are only four of them left, they are heroless, and many of their opponents are armored, meaning they need critical hits to even get close to scratching their targets. But the newly appointed leader gets an idea. There is a chimney in this hut...and where there is a chimney, there is fire!

The eye-patch amazon makes a make-shift brazier so that the squad can add fire damage to their bows.

And that damage increase is enough to overcome one of the crusader Heavy Infantry.

Cavalry Marshall Turn 5

Paco (not the Duck Ninja) attempts to have the Marshal throw a lance to skewer a nearby spearman. The feat fails.

The lance-chucking was all a diversion, however, as one of the Marshal's knights gallops toward the Crusader King. Nonplussed, the spearman who just evaded the lance finds his life ended at the tip of this one!

Crusaders Turn 5

In retaliation, the King and his arab conscripts charge in and make short work of the knight.

And to add insult to injury, my opponents start calling up noobish feats to counteract my creativity (and only hopes of winning ). The Crusader King prays for rain. Apparently this Divinity likes water better than fire...

Amazons Turn 6

Nevertheless, there are more flame pieces in the chimney forge, so the amazons get some more and continue to fire at the Heavy Crusaders. Alas, their skill is low since they can only see the Crusaders' heads. None of the shots connect, and I bet you can guess what my opponent will use his next feat for .

Crusaders Turn 6

The Marshall uses a feat to remount himself and his knight compatriot. The back up into open lanes to set up charges against either the Amazons or the Crusaders.

Crusaders Turn 6

Not Shown: The Crusader king and his Heavy lackeys shuffle into the ruins, giving chase the fleeing Cavalry Marshal.

One of the Arab conscripts makes a bee-line for my Amazons and lands a pretty nice sprint roll! But not nice enough to reach them.

Amazons Turn 7

The amazon's themselves begin running toward the nearby ruins. The crusader king had been a panty-waist last turn and prayed for more rain on my brazier. The ruins are the closest thing on fire. They also open fire on the Arab, but whiff their shots!

And wonder of wonders! A botched feat from the Cavalry Marshal (who was attempting to bring in his own conscripts...) found favor with Hades who brought Valkyria back from the dead! The Amazons are saved...

Marshal Turn 7

Perhaps because of the turn of events, perhaps because he planned it all along, the Marshal charges the amazons rather than the crusaders. Only one charge connects and ends the Amazon's life. Three remain.

Crusaders Turn 7

And wouldn't you know it...Seeing the dead rise, the Crusader and his lackey charge in a kill Valkyria a second time, even before she has had the opportunity to do anything with her second chance. Remember how I said these guys were N@@bs?

Amazons Turn 8

Small consolations, though: the conscript is finally gunned down, and two of the Amazons make it safely away from the charging knights. The other is left to fend for herself.

Marshal Turn 8

Now that my Amazon's don't pose a threat with their flaming arrows, the Marshal and his man charge into the Crusader Heavies. One of the Frenchies bites the dust.

Crusaders Turn 8

In fact, a second one may have bitten the dust, too. Nevertheless, the Crusader King boldly charges in, but whiffs.

Amazons Turn 9

AAAND....

While the horses have their backs turned, my Amazons sprint to the ruins and reclaim more fire for their bows! Yay!

Marshal Turn 9

The Marshal sends his knight in to take care of the problem, but the knight fumbles his lance, allowing the other Amazons to leap back while the brazier holder smacks the horse a couple of times! The mount is now on FIRE!

And the knight does the only thing he can think of in this situation...sends his horse galloping into then nearest body of water. Sadly, the knight forgot that a horse in armor will drown pretty quickly. At least it is not on fire anymore!

The Marshal then sidles up and tries to overcome the flaming Amazon. He, too, is ineffective.

Crusaders Turn 9

Conga Line! The Crusader King makes a rear charge on the Marshal but STILL fails to wound. This has turn into a game of dead horses and anti-climactic charges, I swear!

Endgame

So at this point, nine turns in and plenty of finals still to take, we called the game. Ronald Reagan had a lot of things to do, Paco was getting tired, and I was secretly getting super-frustrated at my semi-lame opponents who kept complaining how long the game was taking while performing feats that inherently prolonged the game . Here is a little view of the carnage sans Crusaders.

Hope you all enjoyed another moment of Rev's Battle Reports. This one wasn't as nail-biting or exciting as some of the others, but I'll take what I can get, I suppose. I have Ronald Reagan and Paco roped in for more brikwars (they both like it), but I may have to sit them down before our next bout and have a short lecture on the Spirit of the Game

Stormblessed wrote:Can you at least give us a teaser of what is to come?

And everyone is the same way for their first brikwar, hesitwnant to attack.

Nope, certainly not. All the teaser you need is contained in these photographs. But if you must know, the battle involves incessant cavalry charges, amazon's leaping on rooftops, Crusaders praying for rain, drowning horses, look-out towers reduced to flaming rubble, a warrior princess who dies twice, and two warrior kings who can never muster enough damage to kill each other!

And if you simply MUST have pictures of battle before the weekend - since it looks like you are new here or former lurker - hop on over to this thread and read over my other battle reports. That should keep you entertained .

Rev. Sylvanus wrote:We also ended up using the new 2010 armored rules for heavy armor and shields. I gotta say, I was not really a fan. Armored units made this game last twice as long as it might have otherwise. Granted, both of my opponents also took the game somewhat seriously and so did a lot of position jockeying rather than just running into combat (I think actual combat didn't really happen until turn 4 ...I'll have to teach them a thing or two.

This is less a problem with Armored, and more a problem with the fact that BrikWars doesn't do anything to discourage position jockeying in general. I've been trying to figure out a way around this for years; my best guess so far is to mandate battle objectives to grab quickly if your opponent doesn't engage fast enough. I've written and deleted an Objectives section for BW2010 probably a half dozen times now.

That was one of the first things I tried, it's what eventually turned into the Unmighty Penny. But then it was tough to know where to the draw the line - is that guy really stalling for time, or is he maneuvering to set up an attack, etc. Unmighty Pennies turned out to be a failure and I abandoned them.

Rev. Sylvanus wrote:We also ended up using the new 2010 armored rules for heavy armor and shields. I gotta say, I was not really a fan. Armored units made this game last twice as long as it might have otherwise. Granted, both of my opponents also took the game somewhat seriously and so did a lot of position jockeying rather than just running into combat (I think actual combat didn't really happen until turn 4 ...I'll have to teach them a thing or two.

This is less a problem with Armored, and more a problem with the fact that BrikWars doesn't do anything to discourage position jockeying in general.

But it is still an issue involving Armored, and for the first three or four games we played with any armored figs, this was the major complaint. Anyone in armor would be way too slow to do anything, and way too hard to kill for first-time players. Generally, it turned into guys plinking away at an armored dude until someone rolled a 6 AND did enough overskill damage to kill him. If anyone ever gets caught in a 1-on-1 melee fight with an armored fig, victory is near impossible unless they're using a 2-handed weapon.

One workaround could be headshots, or other attacks aimed at soft weaknesses in the armor: at a UR of +2, the armor can be pypassed entirely. When using automatic weapons, remember that if firing at an armored figure removes one die from each weapon, landing multiple shots from an autogun will overload the armor (I'm not sure if this is how it's *supposed* to work, but this is how I play). Finally, use those damn charge attacks!

If they're not engaging in combat until the later turns, you need to engage them first. Simple as that. If they want to "win" and have the most surviving guys at the end of the game, it's their loss.